Edit: sorry, i hadn't read the previous mails which cover the same points while writing this one.

badandy wrote:b dude has a point, there is no way to tell whether a very basic word has been borrowed from latinate into germanic or vice versa, such as 'cat' and 'two.'

Oh, quite often (but indeed not always), there is a way to tell! And in the case of the word 'cat', it can be substantiated that it is certainly not a Germanic word originally, but a loan from, or rather via, (Late) Latin. 'Late' because a few very typically Germanic sound changes didn't work at that moment anymore. I read about two possible origins, viz. a Celtic or a North-African origin for the word.

"i drove my wagon off a cliff with our ugly friend as the lights went out all over my little town. I can not understand why writing only in Germanic words is so hard. if the words have sister words in Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, German, then they are from the good old English tongue, before it was undone by the Gauls."

- Germanic: via Latin, prob. from Celtic.

Frank

PS: I hope this is not regarded as nitpicking. I just love to look up these kinds of things. And as written before, i wouldn't like to write even a short "Germanic-only" note in my (Germanic) native tongue Dutch.

[quote]Oh, quite often (but indeed not always), there is a way to tell! [/quote]

I understand that there exists such a thing as language reconstruction, and ways to discover previous forms, and cat, admittedly was a bad example. Maybe if the word was bird or fish we could all agree but 'two,' is neither Germanic or Romance or Slavic, etc. and at the same time it is all of the above. its not exclusive to any of these and neither is the word German or Deutsch or Allemagne.

Just hightlight the text you want to quote and press quote and a new window will open where you can post. However, I normally just put the text encircled by (quote) (/quote) (where a [ should be used for a (.

badandy wrote:but 'two,' is neither Germanic or Romance or Slavic, etc. and at the same time it is all of the above. its not exclusive to any of these and neither is the word German or Deutsch or Allemagne.

Ferrus wrote:Still, it makes more sense than the French and Spanish Allemand, named after a specific tribe.

Not to mention the Anglish...!

Although there is a degree of logic there - English being but the first half of 'Anglo-Saxon' - although the Jutes (as usual) are ignored.

Actually... after having studied this in some depth it is questionable whether such labels have much meaning beyond the political circumstances that were to later create them as written culture emerged too.